Double Down on Demons (Pandora's Pride Book 1)

by Annabel Chase

  “Those demons can be summoned?” I asked, aghast. “Why would anyone want to summon them?” That would be an awful lot of power at the summoner’s disposal, not to mention incredibly foolish when the Tzitzimime’s claim to fame was their desire to destroy the world.

  Liam lunged forward with the stick, attacking the empty air in front of him. “Some kids pull the fire alarm at school. This one summoned a pack of celestial demons. It happens.”

  Tate’s hands curled into fists. “It happens? What planet do you live on?”

  “The one where monsters fall from the sky, apparently.” He stopped his stick maneuvers and observed the angry witch. “What’s the big deal? We fight dangerous beings all the time. These weren’t special.”

  Tate grew flustered. Her cheeks brightened to a cherry red and her eyes seemed to blaze with the agitation of an entire coven. “Has a zombie eaten your brain?”

  “That would explain a lot,” Leto said.

  I swiveled back toward the heart of town. “Anybody notice which house had the most blood smeared?”

  Liam grinned. “Why? You hungry? I suppose stale blood is better than no blood at all.”

  I ignored him and stalked back toward the residential buildings. The footsteps behind me let me know that I wasn’t alone in the quest.

  “This one,” Saxon called. Leave it to the half vampire to figure it out that quickly. The rest of us crowded behind him at the boarded-up door.

  “I can open it. Just take a few steps back.”

  “Are you sure?” Saxon asked. “We can tear everything down.”

  “I’m fine, thanks.” I couldn’t hear Tate’s incantation, but I saw the witch flick her fingers. The boards dropped to the porch and the door snapped open as though she’d turned the unlocked handle.

  The five of us fanned out inside the house. I took the steps two at a time to check out the upstairs bedrooms. I had a feeling that was where we’d find our answer. If I were preparing for a huge monster strike and didn’t want anyone in my family to stop me, that’s where I’d do it. Framed photographs and hand drawn pictures on the wall along the staircase told me there were children at home. Or there had been.

  The first bedroom door was open and I poked my head inside to find a tidy room with a neatly made bed. The books were stacked on shelves in an orderly fashion. They hadn’t left in a hurry and they hadn’t taken much with them, which suggested to me they didn’t intend to be gone for very long.

  I continued down the hall to the next room. Although this door was closed, I smelled something…bitter. Cautiously I turned the knob and gave the door a gentle push. My gaze alighted on an altar at the foot of the bed smothered in blood—whose blood I didn’t want to know.

  “I found it!” I continued to search the contents of the room for any clue as to why these demons were summoned. In the drawer of the bedside table, I found a journal.

  “Oh, wow.” Saxon was next in the room. “You were right.”

  “Try not to sound so surprised,” I said. “It’s been known to happen on occasion.”

  He crossed the room to examine the altar more closely. “Have you touched anything?”

  I held up the journal. “Only this. I’m looking for the most recent entry.” I skipped ahead to about two-thirds of the way through the journal and there it was. I only had to skim a few paragraphs to confirm my theory.

  “A summoning? Really?” Liam entered the room, sounding disappointed. “I was kind of hoping for a more interesting reason.”

  “Doesn’t get more interesting than this,” I said. I snapped the journal closed. “Desperate times called for desperate measures. Someone here had a vision that a demon was coming for their children. They didn’t know the particulars.”

  “But they decided vigilantism was the way to handle it,” Leto said, crowding into the small bedroom.

  “Can you blame them?” I asked. “They’re a remote town. They rely on each other. They probably don’t have a lot of faith in law enforcement, even supernatural ones.”

  “Sounds like you can relate,” Saxon said.

  I brushed aside his comment. This wasn’t about me.

  “Why would they unleash demons like the Tzitzimime?” Tate asked. She opened the journal to the relevant pages and snapped photos with her phone. Smart.

  “My guess is that they didn’t know exactly what they were summoning,” I said. “They just wanted creatures powerful enough to fight off whatever evil was coming for their children and then they hightailed it out of town to wait it out.”

  “At least we know Supai didn’t get his grubby hands on these kids,” Leto said.

  Small mercies.

  “We should leave a note for them to get in touch with our office after they come home,” Tate said. “Abra will want us to come back and speak to them.”

  I doubted they would. Insular people on the mountain steered clear of official channels of any kind. It was just their way.

  “I’ll check in with HQ and let them know we’re on the way home,” Tate said, tapping on her phone as we vacated the house.

  “I need to return the truck to its owner,” Saxon said, “so tell Emil we’ll have him reopen the portal when we get back to the original spot.”

  Liam moaned. “Ugh. That’s so much traipsing through the desert.”

  “I’ll carry you on my back if it keeps you quiet,” Leto said.

  I climbed into the back of the pickup truck to join them. “There’s still an unanswered question that’s bothering me.”

  “What’s that?” Liam asked.

  “What do you call a fake noodle?”

  He and Leto exchanged amused glances. “An impasta,” they said in unison.

  Nobody laughed.

  Chapter Ten

  Upon our return to HQ, we were immediately whisked away to the healer’s office for inspection and treatment.

  “Let the delousing begin!” Liam shouted as he disappeared down the corridor.

  I nodded off in the waiting area and was shaken awake by a firm hand.

  “I’m strong, but I think carrying you to the exam room would be a mistake,” Harmony said.

  “Sorry,” I mumbled. “I was more tired than I realized.” I wasn’t prone to fatigue, but it made sense given what we’d been through in Bones Crossing.

  “Then let’s get you finished quickly so you can have a well-deserved rest. Everyone else is done.” She turned and retreated to the exam room and I hurried after her. An indulgent bath and a comfy bed were the only things I wanted in the world right now.

  I ducked behind the curtain and changed into the breezy gown. “Ready.”

  Harmony slid the curtain aside and wrapped the blood pressure gauge around my arm. “I expected you to be more beat up than this.”

  “I bet there’s a massive bruise on my lower back,” I said. “I fell pretty hard.” Although the moment the words left my mouth, I realized that my back no longer hurt at all.

  Harmony leaned over and lifted up the back of my gown. “Hmm. I don’t see any marks.”

  “I’ve always been a fast healer,” I said. “Mage genes.”

  “I see,” she said. “Does anything hurt? Any aches or pains?”

  “Nothing that a shower and a nap won’t fix.”

  She tugged on a pair of gloves. “Want to talk about anything that happened in the field?”

  I smiled. “Are you a therapist too?”

  “No, but sometimes the agents feel more comfortable sharing with me because they know it won’t end up in a report.”

  I shifted my exposed bottom on the cool table. “Did Tate tell you what happened?”

  Harmony stuck a thermometer under my tongue. “About the tree demon or the monsters falling from the sky?” She removed the thermometer and examined the results. “Normal too. Your body is in perfect working order.” She set the instrument aside and scrutinized me. “What about the rest of you?”

  “I’m fine.” I started to get off the table, but she blo
cked me.

  “Listen, Callie. I don’t believe in forcing anyone to talk before they’re ready, but based on what I heard, you had a couple of nasty experiences for your first field trip. Maybe you’d feel better if you talk about it.” She glanced over her shoulder at the closed door. “Whatever you say won’t leave this room, I swear.”

  Trust no one.

  My father’s words haunted me, although he clearly didn’t mean Harmony. The healer was now part of a life he never imagined for me.

  “I don’t know what I feel right now, to be honest. A little shellshocked from the whole ordeal.”

  “Makes sense.”

  “I’ve been through a lot of harrowing moments in my life, but none like these.”

  Harmony cocked her head. “By ‘these,’ you mean…”

  “Destroying the Tzitzimime.” I shook my head to stave off the memory. “And the nightmare from the Quercus demon.”

  Harmony held a depressor in front of my mouth. “Open wide.” She proceeded to examine the inside of my mouth. “Tell me about the nightmare.” She set aside the depressor and checked my pupils.

  “It was the memory of my father’s death, except with weird stuff thrown in that didn’t really happen.”

  “Like?” Harmony removed the gloves and tossed them into the hazardous waste bin.

  “I was like Saxon.”

  She laughed. “Handsome and brooding?”

  “Is he the brooding type? I can’t decide.”

  “Stick around long enough and you’ll see.”

  “I had fangs.”

  “Ah, I see what you mean. Like Liam, too, then.”

  I grimaced. “No, definitely not like Liam. Never like Liam.” Gods help me.

  Harmony studied me. “That’s it? You had fangs? Doesn’t sound so terrible.”

  “I tore my father’s killer to pieces…and I didn’t even flinch.”

  “Hmm. How did that make you feel once you were back to reality?”

  My hand instinctively flew to my stomach. “Sick.”

  “Sounds like a normal response to me.”

  Except the part where I enjoyed it, but I decided to keep that to myself.

  She checked my ears. “It sounds like you and Tate detonated your own nuclear bomb. Is that normal for you?”

  “Of course not, but I never faced a situation that dire either.”

  “No, I guess not.”

  The healer scribbled a few notes in my file. “How have you felt since you stopped taking your potion?”

  “For the disease I didn’t have? Fine, I guess. It’s not like it’s been very long.”

  “But you haven’t taken it?”

  I shook my head.

  “Would you mind bringing me what’s left of it?”

  I cocked my head. “Why? I don’t need to order any more of it.”

  “I’m interested in what your father was using to treat you. Maybe it’s a little-known potion that could help others.”

  “Okay, I’ll bring it tomorrow.”

  The healer looked me over one more time and nodded. “Okay then. You’re free to change. Just be sure to let me know if you suffer from so much as a headache. No need to prove how tough you are.”

  “I will.”

  “Don’t change back into your clothes. They’re covered in blood. Put on the spares on the chair in the corner.”

  The second she tugged the curtain across, I changed into clean clothes and left the healer’s office, eager to get back to my room at Salt. Before I could escape the building, I was intercepted by Doran.

  “Ah, Calandra. There you are. We’d like to see you before you disappear.”

  “Now?” I knew I looked pained, but I felt pained. I was desperate for sleep.

  “We’d like to debrief you before the details get too fuzzy. Standard procedure.”

  “Standard procedure,” I mumbled. “Yes, of course.”

  “Excellent. Follow me. The others are waiting. We’ve just finished with Tate.”

  I followed Doran to a conference room on the main floor. As soon as I crossed the threshold, I spotted Saxon seated in the corner of the room on his own. It seemed he was to be an observer during my debriefing. I flashed a weary smile, but he didn’t acknowledge me.

  “Sit down, Calandra,” Abra said, gesturing to the hot seat across from the five of them—Abra, Doran, Natasha, Purvis, and Emil. There was no circular table in this room, only the rectangular one that left me feeling like I was about to face a firing squad. The feeling was decidedly uncomfortable.

  Abra folded her hands on the table. “Tell us about Nevada.”

  I stared blankly at them. “What more would you like to know?” I had to imagine they’d gotten enough versions of the story already, given that I was the last to be debriefed.

  “I’ll start with an easy one,” Emil said. “What happened to the residents?”

  Was this some kind of pop quiz? “They fled in anticipation of the demons’ arrival.”

  “And how did they know to expect the demons?” Natasha asked. She twisted open a bottle of deep red polish and proceeded to drop dainty dabs of paint on her fingernails.

  “One of the residents summoned them. We found the altar and journal notes.” That Tate had likely shared with them during her debriefing.

  “People called those monstrous beings there on purpose.” Natasha clucked her tongue. “Humans can be so foolish. I swear it makes a woman grateful to be undead.”

  “They were desperate,” I said. “They knew something was coming for their kids and they didn’t want it tracking them when they left. As far as I can tell, they wanted the Tzitzimime to destroy their unknown enemy. They probably didn’t realize that the celestial demons would actually destroy the world in the process.”

  “Like I said, foolish,” Natasha scoffed.

  “I actually think it was bold and pretty smart.” These were humans living in a tiny desert town, not supernatural agents with unlimited access to resources.

  Natasha’s hand stilled and her gaze flicked to me. “Smart? You can’t be serious.”

  “I am. Have you ever seen the movie Jurassic Park?” I asked. It was a classic that my father and I had watched one rainy winter’s day in a motel off the interstate after dropping off a group of travelers. They’d needed safe passage to Denver because the man had lost his job in a specialized field, which meant their only options were to change careers in his mid-forties or relocate. They chose to relocate.

  “I love that movie,” Natasha said. “The rest of the franchise, not so much.”

  “At the end of the first movie, what happens?” I asked.

  Natasha blew on her wet nails. “They let the T-Rex loose to defeat the enemy that they couldn’t—the velociraptors.”

  Abra remained expressionless. “And you think the residents of the town decided to unleash their own demonic version of the T-Rex to deal with the demons they knew would be coming?”

  I leaned back in my chair and folded my arms. “According to the journal, that’s exactly what happened. They acted on the limited information they had. They didn’t know what we do—about Rex or the Velvet and Abaasy demons. About Supai. Their children were in danger and they took a risk.”

  “If the town was full of humans, then who spearheaded this misguided effort?” Abra asked.

  I frowned. “Tate took photos of the journal pages. Didn’t you see them?”

  “I’m asking the questions right now, Miss Wendell,” Abra said.

  “She did,” Natasha chimed in, “but she likes the sound of her own voice, which means asking questions she already knows the answer to.”

  Abra shot her a look of annoyance. “I beg your pardon, my dear. I’m not the one addicted to karaoke.”

  Natasha shrugged. “I have a beautiful voice. All the bartenders say so.”

  “It’s not your voice they’re ogling, my darlin’,” Purvis said.

  Natasha reached across the table and patted my hand. “Tomorrow night at
Twinkle Twinkle Little Bar. You should come. It would do you good to get out and circulate.”

  I pulled my hand away, slightly uncomfortable. “I’m not much of a performer.”

  “That’s not what we heard,” Emil said. “Sounds like you gave quite the bravado performance in Bones Crossing, in fact.”

  “We understand things got a bit more heated than you intended,” Natasha said.

  “Is that supposed to be a joke?” I asked.

  “Poor form, Tasha,” Doran said, giving his head a disappointed shake.

  In a rush to defend myself, I quickly explained the spell that Tate and I intended to perform as well as the actual outcome.

  “And why do you think that happened?” Doran asked.

  “We messed up the spell, I guess,” I said. “Maybe we shouldn’t have tried to combine our magic.”

  “Saxon says that you handled yourself admirably,” Doran said.

  My gaze shifted to the vampire-angel hybrid, who suddenly found the floor tiles fascinating. “I appreciate that,” I said. “I felt like a mess, but I’m glad I hid it well.”

  “It was your first real experience in the field, the warehouse notwithstanding,” Doran said. “I’d be concerned if you were overly confident.”

  “Yes, we corner the market when it comes to confidence,” Natasha said.

  “Vampires aren’t the only species with an overabundance of confidence,” Purvis said.

  Abra glared at them. “Is it really necessary to argue about which of your species is more confident?”

  Purvis fiddled with his pen. “No,” he said, sulking.

  “Because he knows we would win.” Natasha flipped her twists over her shoulder with an air of triumph. So not only did vampires not age, they didn’t mature either. Good to know.

  “Is there anything you’d like to share about your experience?” Emil asked. “Anything you saw that was noteworthy?”

  “Or anything you felt?” Doran added.

  “It was definitely a whole new experience for me,” I said. “It wasn’t like the kind of dangers we encountered on the mountain.”

  “How was Liam to work with?” Natasha asked. She leaned forward and stared at me. “Be honest. You can tell us if he was a complete pain in the ass.”